Alkalinity
by Kanousei
Summary: Roxas and Namine, the terrible twins, were unstoppable. But hidden away in the mountains of god-knows-where is Reiketsukan Academy, and the man with eyes like green glass. Nothing can ever be the same.
1. Hydrogen: The Beginning

A/N: This is my third fic with a May-December-ish pairing, though I suppose May-August might be more appropriate. My third fic with an… "innocent" young blonde getting tangled up in something with some older male teacher/authority figure. TT But ah! This is only my second teacher-student fic… Yes, I am pathetic. I think that almost all j-rockers and video game characters look like rockstars anyway, so I was tempted to go down that road again… But I think it would have been way too much like my fic Acidic, and we can't have that…

2nd A/N: I don't actually play KH. I have, however, spent hundreds of hours (and this isn't an exaggeration) sitting at the computer and glancing over my shoulder at the screen while my brother plays KH, KH II, FF X, FF X-2, and some FF VIII. I've also seen Advent Children several times on my own. This is the limit of my knowledge, and part of the reason I felt it necessary to make this fic an AU, other than my obvious love of the genre. So if I screw up specifics and I make random characters pop in (and since I can't keep the Organization XIII members straight other than Axel, Roxas, and Demyx) don't kill me ;;; And this will be almost entirely an AkuRoku, but I might dabble in some RikuSora and possibly even a bit of CloudSephirothXemnas (Mwahahahahaha!) on the side. Don't panic. It's all about the AkuRoku.

3rd A/N: This is a plot bunny, and if I think no one else is craving this specific scenario as I am, I'll spare them my further ramblings. But I won't know unless you tell me!

4th A/N: Shutting up now

**And the surname Reiketsukan, which is rather important, means "heartless" or a "cold-blooded person"**

This story doesn't take place in a certain country, though obviously the main characters are meant to be Japanese. (With impossible hair and eye colors, I know, I know) I'll just invent the culture of my imaginary country as I go along, ne?

**Disclaimer: Roses are red, violets are blue; me no own, so you no sue!**

x(X)x

Roxas had heard that torture was only torture if it was equal to organ failure or death. This seemed an increasingly preposterous claim, as anyone who knew _anything_ about torture, he decided, would have included high school. And if not high school, then private boarding schools stuck in mountains would have to make the cut.

He and Namine crouched behind a neatly manicured hedge, peeping over the dense shrubbery every few moments to scowl at the sprawling institution that seemed ready to pick itself up off its foundation and devour them at any moment. They exchanged speculative glances.

"So…" Namine began, chewing idly on an unpainted thumbnail, "I think you should be the gentleman. Sacrifice yourself and let me escape and all that. I'm younger, and… that's relevant, somehow."

Roxas snorted, administering a none-too-gentle rap on the skull. "By six minutes? Screw that. And everyone's nine months older than they say they are, anyway, so we're tied. This place is more than a little screwy, though… and we still don't know what it's _called_-"

Roxas would have continued, with many other witty observations, had a squirrel not chosen that particular moment to launch itself at him.

While yelping a very unmanly yelp, he launched himself from the gap in the hedge and into a group of students who had, until that moment, busied themselves with looking dignified. After several long minutes of pawing through his clothes and muttering about mutant squirrels, he determined that his furry assailant had gotten away.

Just as he was about to grab his sister and find a safer, squirrel-free place to lurk, a silvered head appeared at the window under which he and Namine had been crouching. He felt rather than saw the spines of all the strangers around him straighten.

"I think," the unidentified male (who looked suspiciously like a rock star) drawled, "that it's time all of you graced your teachers with your… dedicated presences.

"You two," he continued, gesturing to Roxas and Namine, "will join me in my office. Just come through the window, will you? I'm not going to spend the next hour waiting for you to find it from the inside."

x(X)x

If Roxas had thought the inside of the building would be more normal than the façade, (and he hadn't really, but he had hoped like hell) he was completely, utterly, and irrevocably mistaken.

The academy was built like a Gothic cathedral, sprawling in every direction. The stone was not brick or limestone, but a fine-grained black material that he could not recall ever having seen. There were a few functional windows, but they were almost entirely stained glass. The doors were built into high decorative arches. There were bell towers. There were _gargoyles_, snarling at thin air with their claws upraised.

The office was painted a deep burgundy. The carpet beneath his feet was so lush that he felt himself sinking into it. The usual kitschy office accessories were missing, replaced with oil paintings in gilt frames (all of which seemed to depict statuesque angels suffering from too little fabric in all the wrong places), exotic plants, and overstuffed armchairs upholstered in dusky velvet.

The desk was what dominated the room, however – a mammoth construction of dark, reddish wood that gleamed, unobstructed by paperwork, photos of family, a nameplate, or any of the other necessities Roxas had come to expect from his many and varied experiences with administrators.

Even these things, however, could have been taken in stride. An unsteady, shaky stride to be sure, but it would have been possible if not for the man sitting behind the desk with his eyebrows raised expectantly.

The rock star impression was proving hard to shake. For all the traditional luxury of his surroundings, the man was wearing a collared shirt in black silk, artfully frayed and torn. The cufflinks, which Namine had alerted Roxas to in an awed whisper as they scrambled into the room via the high window, were skulls. He was wearing a pair of leather pants that clung everywhere and seemed more suited for a club, which would at least provide the possibility of sex, which the pants seemed to demand.

Roxas couldn't see his feet, but he was positive he would find combat boots, were he to look. There was a delicate silver chain around his neck, but it fell beneath the neckline of the shirt and he couldn't tell what was suspended from it. His hair was an impossible platinum, not blonde at all but a pale silver. He would have dismissed it as a quirky dye job, had it not matched the eyebrows currently arching in amusement.

The eyes, he assured himself, were contacts. No one had gold eyes. Period. Plastic surgery… he regarded the sculpted face before him with some skepticism. Unless the guy had won the genetic lottery, there had been some serious work done. The eyes were slightly tilted and lined in black, the nose straight and neat, the mouth full without being fishy, the jaw strong, and the cheekbones high and sharp. The skin that was firm and taut as skin only is before the age of thirty was tanned surfer-deep.

He began a mental tally of cosmetic surgery expenses. The man – Roxas couldn't bring himself to think of him as an administrator – was obviously comfortable with sharp objects in his skin. He couldn't begin to count all the rings and studs in his ears. One eyebrow bore three rings, a ring in the nose, a stud beneath the lower lip… He knew it was slightly hypocritical of him, given his devotion to the metal in his own skin, but there was a big difference between being a pierced teenager and a pierced twenty-something… employee… at an obviously well-off school.

When his eyes finally stopped roaming, he realized that the official wore an expression of condescending amusement that was slowly bleeding into impatience and irritation. And it occurred to him that he _had_ been staring at a complete stranger for several minutes without saying a word. He felt heat creep up the back of his neck, and he nodded stiffly to the man to signify that his head was out of the clouds.

Apparently satisfied with this, the rock star gestured for them to be seated while retrieving several sheets of blank paper and a fountain pen from within the desk. Roxas found himself wondering idly if they stuffed students into drawers for misbehavior.

"You are Namine and Roxas Reiketsukan. Year Eleven, exceptional test scores, lousy grades, putrid behavioral records. You were allowed such late enrollment only because your parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, etcetera, etcetera, are such valued alumni."

Roxas and Namine exchanged a startled glance. While it seemed natural to know what universities their parents went to, rather than high schools, it seemed that any school as… striking… as this one would bear mentioning. The man continued, however, eyeing them both as if daring them to interrupt him with questions.

"Because of your late enrollment, there are no places for you in the dormitories. The teachers' wing, however, is less crowded. You will be residing in adjoined rooms, and you will not bother the professors. You will return to my office tomorrow morning after breakfast – _immediately _after breakfast – to receive your schedules. Your parents arranged for your belongings to be sent to your quarters, and will unpack this evening so that your trunks may be put into storage.

"Dinner is served at one, afternoon tea at four, supper at eight, and dessert immediately after. Breakfast tomorrow – and all days after, so don't be late – will be served at seven, and morning tea at ten."

He retrieved two heavy files from within the hidden caverns of the desk. When he made no move to rise, they scrambled up and took the files before seating themselves like chastened children.

"Those are rules and information – be sure not to lose your maps. You will not be assigned a guide."

Watching the two gape at him like startled fish, he seemed to conclude that enough information had been provided. Though unwilling only moments before, he now stood and trekked to the door on the far side of the spacious office. When he turned and saw the pair still seated, he tsked and opened the door, gesturing impatiently for them to be gone.

"If you have any questions, bother someone else with them. Unless you kill someone – in which case you may have candy – I don't want to see you in my office again."

They were herded out. Roxas nearly fell over Namine as she dug her feet in at the doorway. Despite the ban on questions, she asked the one that had seemed most important to him, as well.

"Who the hell are you?"

For the first time, the rock star smiled, a sudden too-white grin that spread across his tanned face like an electric current. It was just manic enough to send a small, fearful shiver up Roxas' spine.

"My name is Xemnas Reiketsukan. Guidance counselor extraordinaire."

x(X)x

By the time they reached the teachers' wing, their necks were sore from craning to look at chandeliers, stained glass, and colossal paintings – all of which seemed to dominate the endless corridors. They were, of course, painted plum and floored in rosy marble. Roxas found himself suffering from intense cravings involving cheeseburgers and television. They were extremely well-off, he knew, but there was a difference between an expensive house (six expensive houses, he admitted) and this. Whatever this was.

The teachers' wing itself was a corridor like all the others. Namine voiced her passionate resolution to tattoo the map on an easily accessible body part, but before she could further her debate between forearm and eyelid, there was a minor explosion.

A tangle of arms, legs, and black fabric fell through an open doorway down the hall, tumbling onto the marble with a painful crack. While the rest of the tangle seemed dazed, one part managed to extract itself and vault upright.

He had managed to convince himself that Xemnas was some kind of fluke, the son of the headmaster or something, with enough job security to dress like he was going clubbing. He had managed to convince himself that the professors would be normal; middle-aged, slightly gray around the edges, in cable-knit sweaters and thick eyeglasses.

His fervent hope crystallized and shattered as they drew close enough to see the members of the tangle properly.

On the floor he could see blonde hair and skinny fingers, shared by two men. Where one was stiff even in his discomposure, however, the other seemed happily resigned to his undignified state.

The one standing…

Roxas bit back a groan of frustration.

He looked just a little too old to be a student. There were twin marks below his eyes that had the neat, dark perfection of tattoos. There was metal in his ears, his eyebrows, his nose, his lip, and his tongue, if the glint Roxas could see when he conversed with his fallen companions was any sign. Like every adult he had seen in the building so far, he was wearing leather pants, topped with a long black tank that did nothing to hide the breadth of his shoulders or the narrowness of his waist and hips.

For the first time in years, Roxas found himself feeling honestly self-conscious. He felt childish and small, felt awkward and crude in chipped black nail polish and jeans that were ripped and frayed by time and use rather than a machine.

Then the upright redhead began shouting, and he had other things to think of.

"That's two more down! There are now five suspects left! Return my Fireballs and you will not be harmed! For the love of god, people! You can't take a man's candy! It's inhumane!"

x(X)x

The loud one was Axel, he learned. The stiff one was Vexen, the smiling one was Demyx. He felt strange, calling professors by their first names, even professors who didn't _look _like professors. But what else could they do, when they all had the same surname? When they all had _his_ name?

…The name of the school, they learned, was Reiketsukan Academy

x(X)x

Their rooms were as sumptuous as everything else; wallpaper in gold and cream and lush carpets over the pale marble. It turned out that they each had "rooms," as well – four each. A full bathroom with more marble, what Roxas was beginning to suspect were gold plated fixtures – hell, he'd be lucky if they weren't _solid_ gold – a walk-in, glass-doored shower stall larger than the walk-in closets most people were so proud of, and a whirlpool bath big enough for a dozen people to sit without bumping knees.

The kitchen (more marble, he thought with a snarl) was fully equipped with more gadgets and utensils than he would ever be able to work with. There was an island in the center, surrounded by ceiling-high shelves, a matching refrigerator and stove that gleamed so much his eyes hurt, a dishwasher, and everything from porcelain to glassware to wooden bowls and spoons. The kitchen was so extensive, in fact, that he began to wonder if one was given raw foods at meals and sent back to their rooms to prepare it.

There was an enormous area that managed to act as a study, a personal library, a dining room, and a living room without feeling at all cluttered. Roxas was growing so sick of the polished, palatial furnishings that be barely glanced at them, heading towards the bedroom instead and steeling himself for whatever he found.

He had seen photos of the royal bedroom in the Palace of Versailles. It looked a lot like that.

Over the two chandeliers, he could crane his neck and see the ceiling thirty or so feet above him, painted with a fresco of angels and demons. There was gilt molding everywhere, and a velvet chair by the window. The near the fireplace, which just so happened to be sculpted with cherubs trying to fly in every direction, was the bed. The tent.

The canopy extended at least fifteen feet in the air, where it attached to a velvet-encased chain fixed to the ceiling. The bedspread, like everything else in the room, was a deep, rich blue shot through with gold thread and seed pearls.

After confirming that their rooms were equally insane, they escaped to lunch, leaving all their belongings untouched in the trunks.

x(X)x

They had a hushed discussion over lunch (which looked like the lovechild of French gourmet and Japanese traditional cuisine – Roxas chose to ignore the caviar, which made him twitch) concerning the likelihood of their name being shared by four administrators, as well as the school itself. They discussed the weirdness of their surroundings, and the oddities of the teachers.

When they got bored, they expressed mutual admiration for certain posteriors, though Roxas thought that noticng Axel's was a given, since he had been stomping around the corridor so much. For Namine to have even been _looking_ at Xemnas'… He shuddered, and agreed to discontinue all discussion when Namine assured him that having a nice ass didn't make one a particularly nice person.

They discussed the casual announcement their parents had made the day before, on a seemingly innocent Saturday morning. They discussed the private plane, the helicopter up into the mountains, and the fact that they truly didn't know what country they were in, aside from the fact that everyone was speaking English in every accent imaginable.

And when they were finished complaining, and were quite sure that they had established to everyone in a twenty-meter radius that they were badasses who thought all this beneath them, they leaned together and laughed about the fantastic weirdness of it all.

x(X)x

The tables were all meant to sit four, and even then one would find a table with two people, like theirs, or just one – and others shoved together so that a few dozen friends could chat.

Everyone else was already in uniform. Black suits that seemed to fit perfectly for the guys, with neat, black silk ties and burgundy oxfords. Namine insisted that the suits were Armani, and since Roxas couldn't identify any brand without the name printed in large letters, he couldn't argue.

The girls wore black skirts that only came to mid-thigh, coupled with fitted burgundy corsets black jackets in silk brocade.

Roxas suggested painting themselves white to avoid the herd, while admitting that it was a terrible shame that the herd was so well-dressed. Namine topped him by suggesting that they go without clothing entirely, to see if it would be like the time they did it at High School Number Three.

As they spoke, Roxas found himself glancing at the long table used by the professors beneath an array of stained glass windows. Axel, the loud redhead from the corridor, caught his eye the most.

It was the sort of bizarre circumstance that made him wish for Namine's skill with a brush. In the one seat – Axel's seat – the occupant was bathed in color from the window. His hair seemed to fit, suddenly, as his skin was colored gold, crimson, rose, and tangerine. The light caught on all his piercings and made them shine like water.

He looked like he was on fire.

He looked beautiful.

He was overtly distracting, and Roxas was growing increasingly irritated with him for that reason alone.

_No,_ he thought, _it's the eyes, too._

The feeling that made him look over his shoulder again and again was that feeling of being watched that everyone laughs at but everyone knows.

And yet every time he looked over, Axel more than any of the others was terribly engrossed in his food, or absorbed in a conversation with his neighbor.

Until he looked up and met a pair of glass-green eyes, looking right at him. He waited a moment for Axel to look away, or flush, or yell at him for cutting his filet wrong – any reaction.

Axel didn't look away. After a few moments that seemed to stretch into years, Roxas turned back to his food. He didn't look at anything but Namine and his plate for the remainder of the meal.

Normally he thought of being watched as a chilling feeling. But he felt too hot, like he was the ant on the other end of the magnifying glass when the sun streamed through. The feeling didn't dissipate, and he knew that Axel didn't remove his eyes once.

x(X)x

It would be easy to dismiss it as nothing, he knew. A weird teacher in a weird school.

Except…

Except for the oddly familiar feeling that welled up in his stomach when he caught that blur of red and motion from the corner of his eye. The coming-home feeling.

Except for Axel's words in the corridor, when he spotted the two of them.

When cocked his head to the side, and his eyes lit up in the strangest way, and the crimson hair followed his movement, the myriad spikes falling to one side in a wave.

"Jeez Roxas… it took you long enough to get here."

Because it didn't sound like he was talking about the corridor, or the school.

x(X)x

A/N: I promise that there won't be so much longwinded description in regards to surroundings/clothing and appearances in future chapters! I just wanted to get it out of the way in this. And before anyone has a seizure, this is NOT a NamineXemnas. There will be only minimal het, if any.

And you'll get a clearer view of the characters, too – I really just needed to get them all onstage, ne? No, Roxas is not a totally evil spoiled brat. He just has a bit of a chip on his shoulder. More character development soon to come!

_Leijhana tu'sai_ to all readers and reviewers!


	2. Beryllium

A/N: I usually wait at least a week to update my pathetically-short chapters, but it hasn't even been an hour since I posted the last. XD This is one helluva plot bunny. Since I haven't had a chance to get reviewer feedback on the English vs Japanese name issue, I'll continue with the English names until I know how everyone feels about it.

As always with stories, I was sucked in kicking and screaming. I'm lazy. When I end up writing a story, it's always because I've found a fandom that I like, but not the particular story that I want to read. There are _amazing_ AkuRoku fics, but the only cohesive stories I've found so far run closer to fluffy and relatively clean – and I need my gritty romances with lots of pain and sharp edges. I'm seeing definite sadism-masochism-bondage-domination-submission in this fic's future, ne?

I'll use asterisks if there's a key term of word that may not be understood – if anyone needs clarification, the explanations are in the footnotes.

x(X)x

_He felt the blood spurt over his hands, thick and hot. It grew cold all too quickly in the night air, reminding him of fluids cooling on lovers' skin after passion._

_The woman beneath him twitched, and he tightened the garrote efficiently. He had torn through the flesh all around, and could clearly see the gleam of bone. In better light it would have been a dull yellow, but the moon leeched it of color._

_He still sat over her chest. He felt her heart stop._

_Boredom had never become him, and he felt it creeping in now. With a sigh he bent to remove her eyes. He cut off her nose, and knocked her teeth in with the hilt of a knife for good measure. It served a double purpose: the body would be more difficult to recognize, and the bizarre state of the corpse would have the constable scrambling to find a suspect among the serial killers currently walking free._

_Thirdly, he had hated her. They were harder to kill when he could see the cracks; he found himself sympathizing with them and loving their flaws._

_She hadn't been beautiful, but she was perfect. She had smiled softly, and laughed easily. Gentle, kind, and loving._

_From the moment he saw her he hated her. Hated feeling inferior, dark, craven – broken. He wanted to destroy her for the same reason he wanted to destroy all perfect, beautiful things. The same reason he burnt paintings and broke glass._

_He wasn't perfect or pure. _

_And so he wanted everything else to be as broken and sullied as he was._

_Though he knew they were the only ones in this obscure corner of the public gardens at this hour, he gave their surroundings a cursory glance. Then he dragged the body (it wasn't her anymore, just a cooling sac of meat) through a gap in the hedges and rolled it down the bank and into the river._

_The current picked it up and carried it swiftly until it disappeared from his sight._

_He absently checked the inner pocket of his coat, which was heavy with coin. He didn't know why exactly the client had wanted her dead, but she was certainly dead now._

_It took him less than an hour to reach his lodging – not a home, but it would have to do. It was a neighborhood of brothels and disreputable taverns, and no one batted an eye at a boy barely old enough to be called a man striding down the middle of the road hours before dawn covered in blood._

_He was tired when he reached his room, but sleep was not a priority._

_His priorities began with the hot, long-fingered hands that manacled his wrists, and continued into the tongue scraping the dried blood from his skin, the teeth bruising the skin, the nails cutting into him, the bony hips grinding him down into a thin mattress._

_Roxas's priorities ended with the familiar gesture of a long leg hooking over his his, and watching glass green eyes slide shut._

_And finally, sleep._

_Because Axel was so shattered he was powdered glass, and so completely dark as to be pure again. Because only Axel made him feel like he was being corrupted – and that meant there had to be some purity in him, didn't it? There had to be something to corrupt._

x(X)x

Roxas woke sharply at the insistence of his alarm clock, which he slapped back into silence. The arm that he had extended from beneath the thick duvet reacted to the chill air and snapped back to his side.

The cold was not acceptable. Even under the duvet he began to shiver, and so he reached instinctively for the lanky body that was so adept at warming him up.

And then he registered this, and sat bolt upright.

More disturbing than the instinct was the dream that had prompted it. He seldom dreamed, and even then it was in snippets. Now he had vivid scenes slamming into him, as precise as a frame of film.

To his horror, he felt a stirring between his legs, and knew he was growing hard.

He didn't know if it was the murder or the sex. Because as much as the memory of blood on his hands and a heart stopping beneath him made him shake, he was aware enough to admit that the sex might bother him more.

Killing someone he had never seen in a dream was one thing. Dreaming _of_ a person he had met only a day before…

The strength of everything made him want to hide somewhere small, dark, and safe. He knew anger, and sadness, and even happiness, but these suddenly seemed pale, washed-out facsimiles of emotion compared to the raw passion of the dream.

The killing and the fucking weren't real, but they made mockeries of everything he had ever felt or done. There had been ecstasy, hunger, and lust in both acts, so that the blood and pain seemed to bleed together into something exquisitely _real_.

More real than the world he was waking up to.

More alive.

He wondered if he had always felt this hollow, and was only now noticing.

x(X)x

Namine was the only person who knew him well enough to notice the aberrations in his behavior, but she also knew him well enough to recognize what was fair game and what was do-not-discuss. After a pointed glance, she let it go.

Before breakfast they examined the uniforms that an overtly perky maid brought them.

It was a shame that they _were_ uniforms, as Roxas would have been willing to wear them of his own volition. They were a requirement, however, and the siblings had a particular dislike of requirements.

The girls' brocade jacket was laced in so many places that Roxas was able to widen it in the shoulders and tighten it severely over his narrow hips. He opted to wear just the black tie beneath (in early autumn two layers seemed rather excessive) and forgo a shirt. Namine was pleased with the way his suit jacket fell to her fingertips in the sleeves.

Eyeliner was applied by both, and Roxas pretended to polish his piercings while waiting for Namine to finish ripping a pair of fishnets. He felt slightly unbalanced with so much silver in his brows, ears, and navel and no ink in his skin, but a tattoo had remained harder to arrange than dates with a piercing gun.

x(X)x

After a breakfast that was as opulent as everything else about Reiketsukan Academy, they received their schedules from Xemnas.

"I'm really quite lazy, so I had planned on writing up the same schedule for both of you, but the majority of incidences on your records seem to involve the two of you working in tandem. And I would personally prefer to avoid having our microscopes used in 'modern art installations' involving steamrollers. Which was actually quite inspired. But only because it didn't happen here.

"So you two will not have _any_ classes together for the first semester. I'll award you with more shared classes in future semesters if you can keep your asses in line. Clear? Good. Leave now."

There were three two-hour classes per day, with six classes total. It seemed that they alternated between niger and **cruentus** days. Roxas would have just called them black and red, but the one passerby he had mentioned this to had hissed at him and insisted that they were the school colors, and the school colors were to be referred to in Latin, thank you very much.

Roxas had marveled at how uptight people could be even in a madhouse like this one, and happily flipped the snarky passerby the bird.

On a more pleasant note, however, he found that the boring normalcy was helping to chase away the imprint of the dream. The heat and passion didn't fit the doldrums of school, schedules, and uniforms. He could even laugh a little now, over how disproportionate his reaction this morning had been. The last time he had been so shaken by a dream, he mused, he had been six and terrified of a fire that he saw consuming everything around him.

x(X)x

His first class was Latin, in which he was fluent enough to take a two hour nap. At the end of class he scribbled down the assignments inside the cover of the thick, musty textbook he was given. Then there was morning tea with Namine, during which he was relieved to find Axel missing from the staff table.

The gods, as always, were perverse bastards.

Because he walked into his chemistry class to find the students watching calmly, as if this were a regular occurrence, while the teacher had a little too much fun with the Bunsen burner at his desk.

He saw Axel, and for a moment there was nothing. Then his synapses flared to life, sending remembered heat crashing through his veins while the sensations of his dream slammed into him with the force of a car into a brick wall.

It wasn't until a hand caught his shoulder that he found the eyes of everyone in the room trained on him, and he realized he had frozen in mid-step. His eyes were so wide they hurt, and his breath was coming in short, shallow bursts.

And he didn't have to look up to know whose hand was on his shoulder. The heat seeping through the fabric and into his skin was enough.

He recognized the pale, tapered fingers, and was aware of phantom sensations. He could feel those fingers holding him, caressing him, scratching him, bruising him, _stretching_ him –

With a choked gasp he broke away, staring blindly at a point over Axel's shoulder. He couldn't meet his eyes, for fear of what they would summon.

Roxas then did something he though only other people did, in movies and books and soap operas.

He fainted.

x(X)x

_Leijhana tu'sai _to all readers and reviewers!

garrote - an implement (as a wire with a handle at each end) for strangulation


	3. Lithium

spA/N: Again, I'm so wrapped up in this story that I can't wait to write more. Just don't think it isn't exhausting, ne? And don't get lazy! When I have a block and I'm sitting at the keyboard thinking "I'm a crap writer and I should just give up now" I go back and read reviews to convince myself otherwise. And there are only seven reviews right now! TT Of course that might just mean that I _am_ a crap writer…

**baa-sama **– I'm glad that you like the descriptions, but they really aren't consistent with my usual style of writing, and I feel like they throw things off. And the Palace of Versailles is amazing… I should post a link in my profile…

**chibi neko doll** – So do I! But Roxas and Namine will be whiny wherever they are, I guess XD Thanks for your input! It's not the wrong link, but I do feel like I'm writing two stories at once.

**leafyaki – **Isn't it fun? I thought my school was neat, but it's got nothing on the academy. Certainly not teachers who look like rock stars… I'm dying to write some from Axel's POV, but it will be quite a while before I can do so without giving too much away. And I'll keep to the English names, if only because your reviews make me so happy Fluffy Namine had been bothering me, and I'm glad someone else is enjoying her new outlook on life. There WILL be more and more Axel as the story progresses – as I said, I'm dying to write him. And though some of the descriptions are bothering me, the dream sequence came out exactly the way I wanted it to. You keep fixing on my favorite lines! It pleases me so. And as I said before, points to you for being the first to recognize the significance of the fire dream. _Xoxo_

**Memories of Twilight** – _heaves giant sigh of relief_ I'm so glad to see the word "original" used… I'm always terrified of being trite

**blockofthewritingkind – **I'm having way too much fun messing with Roxas… XD

**Benaldo** – as I said before, I feel like I've been caught red-handed. You called me on all the parts of the story I was fretting over, ne? XD Thank you for being honest. And you WILL be my editor, of course. And I'm really thrilled that everyone is reacting so well to the dream sequence.

x(X)x

_He stepped quietly over slumbering bodies that reeked of sweat and wine, avoiding puddles of vomit, urine, and wine. The unconscious forms resembled nothing so much as beached whales, with the occasional lithe form interspersed among them. One of the slender young bodies was attracting more flies than the rest._

_Cassander was still captivating in death. One side of his face had been bludgeoned in by a drunken senator, but the other retained the glowing Greek beauty that had caused him to be stolen from his home by slavers._

_Both eyes remained open, fixed on nothing. The warm brown irises had clouded over, making the dead boy seem like a blind prophet from legend._

_Roxas had no coin to put over the dead boy's eyes, a tradition that Cassander's people required to pass into the afterlife. So he closed the unseeing eyes and padded back out of the dining hall, quickening his step when a guest rolled off her couch and began to stir._

_Two weeks later Aelius sent him to the market to buy a replacement. He asked for a young male strong enough to assist in the running of the household, and attractive enough to please his guests when necessary. Not Greek, he added. There was too much pride in the Greeks._

_Roxas hated that he was considered docile enough to choose other slaves. Someone stronger would refuse, even knowing the pain it would bring them. Someone stronger would try to escape, even knowing that death was the penalty if he were caught._

_He was not strong._

_He nodded wordlessly, and accepted the signet that would prove he was the property of a senator, if a lowly one. _

_Three hours later he found Axel._

_Five weeks later he was kissed for the thousandth time, and it was the first time he understood why people did it._

_Six days later he watched Aelius whip Axel with a flagellum until the skin of his back hung in ragged strips._

_For weeks he bathed the lacerations and dressed them in acetum and honey._

_A year later he could kiss the uneven scar tissue before falling asleep pillowed on warm skin._

_Three years later they tried to escape. _

_They almost made it._

_The guards crucified Axel first, so that he could watch. Before they put the first nail through his own wrist, they had already administered his punishment._

_He was dead for days before he died._

x(X)x

Roxas woke to the feeling of a hand on his bare shoulder. He stiffened immediately, but relaxed as his body registered, even before his eyes were open, that the hand was too cold to be him.

_I've never touched him. They're just dreams. I don't know what his hands are like, and I don't want to._

He grunted awkwardly at Namine, who withdrew her hand.

The juncture of his neck and shoulder felt peculiarly hot, and he wondered if his body was trying to compensate for the cold of Namine's fingers.

The flannel of his pajamas rubbed against his legs as he twitched. Pajamas were good. Pajamas meant that he had just had two very strange dreams, and that it was time to wake up now.

He ran his fingers through his hair lightly, and found no wet stickiness in his scalp. As he would have, he assured himself, had he fallen and made contact with the cold marble.

He finally gave his sister his full attention, taking in her nightclothes.

"Did we oversleep? We can always ditch if you'd rather not deal with the 'guidance counselor extraordinaire'." He was pleased to note that he sounded casual, with just the right amount of boredom.

She opened her mouth as if to speak, and spent a long moment staring at his shoulder. Then her teeth clicked together and she shook her head.

"It's nearly nine, Rox. It's _night. _You've been out most of the day."

x(X)x

When he stepped out of the shower he wiped his hand across the fogged mirror, and froze as his reflection became visible.

The hot spot between neck and shoulder was a livid reddish-purple, and felt slightly sore when he touched it with icy fingers.

He knew exactly how it got there, but didn't let himself think it, for fear that thinking it might make it true.

Instead he rummaged through an as-yet-unpacked box until he found a nail file.

One side was smooth, the other rough as sandpaper.

He scrubbed until the mark was replaced by raw skin, and blood trickled slowly down.

He didn't sleep that night.

x(X)x

A/N: Before anyone panics, I am NOT going to give you gradually shorter chapters. I'm not quite that mean. I was just dying to post more, even though I added chapter two the day before yesterday. Chapter four will be nice and long.

_Leijahana tu'sai _to all readers and reviewers


	4. Magnesium

A/N: I can't stop writing this story, and I'm really behind on my homework now… XD I mentioned this to my Great Books teacher today, and he looked me dead in the eye and said "what you write is more important than any assignment anyone in this school, including me, gives you." TT Call me a sap, but it was touching.

Not many people have brought it up, but the spoken vote seems to be to keep the English names. And so I shall.

x(X)x

Roxas had grown intensely fond of his kitchen. He saw no reason, in fact, to venture beyond it for meals. He stayed in, Namine stayed with him, and they both pointedly ignored the unspoken questions that hung heavy over their heads.

Coffee had developed as well, from The Gross Stuff to his new best friend. It left him jittery and ill-tempered, but not much more so than usual.

He slept in fifteen minute increments every few hours, with two cell phones, his alarm clock, and the oven set to wake him before he could fall too deeply.

The smudges around his eyes morphed from lilac to plum to almost-black. Namine painted intricate patterns around them in the morning, and smeared shadows under her own eyes to match. They looked dead, and they welcomed it.

He had tried sitting through Chemistry once after the last dream, and had made it through a little over an hour as he stared at a fixed spot on the floor and heard nothing.

Then too-hot fingers fell lightly on the square of gauze peeking from his jacket and tried to pull the material back. He bolted before the slow words that shaped from a voice like mulled wine could reach him.

Third block on "niger" days became a sanctuary, curled up like a cat on Namine's couch. They smoked and watched silent movies. She ran her fingers through his hair in perfect time, never faltering. He felt safe, and pretended he was still in the womb.

No officials came stomping down the door. Perhaps it was just the lack of an intercom, but no frazzled summons to visit the opulent offices were relayed.

They abstained from life in small doses.

After eleven days of sleep snatched and released before quiet, dark release could take hold, Roxas crashed. He would later blame it on the mice, keys, and swooping black shapes that kept appearing at the edges of his vision.

He was _not_ hallucinating, he mentioned fervently to the dancing candlestick that was keeping him company.

x(X)x

_He caressed the strings delicately, making no sound as his fingertips ran down the length of the lute. The tightly wound gut cut into the fleshy pads, but he continued until all the strings gleamed with his blood in the sputtering firelight._

_He would not play tonight. The crusaders currently struggling to coax the flames back to life were not the glorious heroes for whom tales were written._

_For years he had sung stirring tales of war. Now, having seen it, he knew that only those in ignorance could make it glorious._

_A hand tangled itself in his thick hair, just enough pain to be pleasurable. He did not start or flinch. The heat in the skin would have told him who towered behind him, had he not known already from the sound of the owner's footsteps and the pattern of his breathing._

_Without taking his hands from his mistress, her strings drinking his blood, he craned his neck to meet the eyes of his master._

_The Lionheart ignored the sudden exclamations of his soldiers and the conspicuous silence that had settled over the surrounding campfires._

_The king did not speak. _

_His eyes said "come"._

_The Lionheart turned and strode away without a stutter in his fluid stride, not once glancing over his shoulder. Roxas followed him, of course. At the front of his bright tent, the king held the flap open so that his minstrel could enter first._

_He watched with clinical distaste as a tousled brown head shot up and the body attached to it jerked into sun-bleached robes. Sorrel darted away like a mouse, and Roxas was left more sickened than ever by the fact that he could be so often compared to _that

_Sorrel was a minstrel, but not the king's. Sorrel was more innocent in the eyes, less sparing in his speech. And English, Roxas reminded himself with a snort. Never send an Englishman to do a Frenchman's work._

_He did not consider Richard Coeur de Lion an Englishman. He might have been their king, but his soul was French._

_Richard paced, his reddish mane catching in the poor light of tallow candles. When combined with the intensity and efficiency of his movements, it made him seem a lion in more than name._

_Roxas was told to sing and he did so. He sang soothing, meaningless ballads of rolling hills and clear skies until the king sank to the mess of cushions and tapestries that served as his bed. When a gleaming jade eye fixed him with a baleful glare, he began singing stories of love._

"_Why do you stay here?" he would ask the Lionheart._

"_Because it is all I am," would be his answer._

_When scarred hands closed over his mouth, he was silent. They fell away, as did the mantle of sovereignty, and left only a man tensed in desperation. _

"_He wasn't me."_

"_How could he be? How could anyone? It was like sawdust and smoke." The voice that rang out over battlefields was rough with despair._

_Richard ran callused fingers over his lips before kissing him. It began softly, and grew in urgency when Roxas did not respond. He remained cold beneath heated ministrations. Finally the Lionheart sunk his teeth into his minstrel's shoulder and roared his helpless rage._

"Why?"

_It was so soft against his skin he almost missed it._

"_Once you have me," he murmured into his king's ear, "you will not need me. So long as you have not had me, you will not let yourself die."_

x(X)x

When Roxas woke he felt stretched with wanting, as if his entire being was housing a building pressure that left him shaking.

He chose to confront matters head-on for once, as logic and data could always be counted on to reduce that which was inexplicable to smoke and mirrors.

And after being assailed by crude portrayals, again and again, of the fierce, flame-haired king the French had called the Coeur de Lion, he began counting all the painkillers thoughtfully stocking his bathroom cabinet.

Namine found him, as always, and meted out espresso and steady distraction until the sun rose and it was time to begin it all again.

x(X)x

When he washed his clothes, he felt the grittiness of sand.

It was the first thing he taught himself to forget.

It wasn't the last.

x(X)x

Whew! Two in one day. o.o Not as long as I had hoped for this chapter to be (sorry) but as long as the story required.

_Leijhana tu'sai_ to all readers and reviewers! Never forget the evil review-eating monster that lives under my desk and holds stories for ransom! (whaps monster on nose with newspaper)


	5. Sodium

A/N: Not only has this fic taken the place of my homework, I spent nearly eight hours today twitching and fidgeting because I didn't _want_ to sit in class, I _wanted_ to be _writing._ I managed to write a couple of pages in English, but I work best at my computer. Wikipedia is my friend, and high school is the enemy.

I tried to be clear in the last chapter, but Richard Coeur de Lion (who was real, mind you) _was_ Axel. As you fall deeper into this little world of mine (and I'm falling with you) the incarnations will be less and less concrete – names and faces will change. Just remember that the two main forces in each dream will always be Roxas and Axel. I just couldn't call him Axel when his name was already Richard, ne?

If you're a geek like me and now curious about the Lionheart, Richard Coeur de Lion, more can be found on Wikipedia.

I want to write a different summary for this story that better represents the story as a whole. If you have any ideas, suggestions, or (best of all) if you have an entire summary off the top of your head for me, please let me know.

**Disclaimer: Roses are red, violets are blue; me no own, so you no sue!**

x(X)x

"_Maybe this man, who didn't believe in love, realized by the time his hair was white that in his heart was something which could be called love."_

- Zhang Jie "Love Must Not Be Forgotten"

x(X)x

Roxas was happily escaping to lilting songs in broken languages when Namine jerked his headphones away and indicated in loose, irritated gestures that someone was knocking at his door. Now that his source of soothing oblivion was diverted, he did register a staccato beat drifting through his sanctuary.

He found Axel at his door, narrow-eyed and breathing heavily. Roxas' intentions must have shown in his eyes, because long fingers caught the door even as he sought to slam it.

Lanky limbs and flashing eyes slipped through the gap in a rush of warm air. Axel leaned against the closed door and his head fell back in the boneless, tired motion of a puppet with cut strings.

His glassy eyes were shuttered, but it lent him no illusion of serenity. Roxas saw him as a quivering figure of wire stretched to breaking. Without moving, his tension radiated outward in stinging waves. Roxas felt them skitter over his skin like sparks.

He stepped away from the too-still figure in his doorway and collided with Namine, who was standing behind him and glaring at Axel with enough heat to burn the flesh from his bones.

He heard Namine yelling, heard it rise in pitch to a vengeful female keen.

He heard Axel shouting and murmuring helplessly in turns.

He excavated a deep grave in his mind. He placed himself inside it and covered himself in cool, black soil until the words could not reach him.

In the world that people other than Roxas could see, he assumed the ever-reliable fetal position on the lush carpet that was currently bearing witness to the debacle and began silently cataloguing the creatures of the fanciful environment embroidered therein.

It required no thought, only dull concentration. It was a blessed relief, even though he had never particularly liked ducks.

He couldn't quite not-see when the music instructor, Demyx, barged in and dragged Axel out.

He couldn't quite not hear when Axel screamed his name.

x(X)x

They began absenting themselves from other classes, until the only human contact necessary was Kairi, the too-sweet girl who collected their homework from their teachers and dropped it off in the evenings. Neither had any positive inclination towards the homework itself, but Roxas welcomed it as a source of mindless occupation to keep him from falling asleep. And whatever Roxas did, Namine would do with him.

Kairi would come back for their work the morning it was due, and Roxas never missed the extra warmth in his sister's smile as she handed the burden off. He snarled at the girl whenever possible, willing to rip her apart if it meant holding on to the only person who was keeping the pieces of his mind from scattering in all directions.

He broke glasses to supply himself with shards, and bled himself into bowls so Namine could paint sweeter dreams onto his skin.

Namine cut away another hank of her hair each day to burn as dreadful, cloying incense. They did not know what they were mourning.

It had finally occurred to him to ask Namine, in questions of vague shadow, if she herself had walked terrifying roads in her dreams. She said she had not dreamed at all since their coming.

She said she was sorry for not being able to lessen his pain.

"If it were a matter of lessening the pain, I wouldn't be breathing. But if dying means eternal rest, it might mean eternal dreams."

A few hours later he fell too deeply, and Namine was not able to rouse him.

x(X)x

_In the balmy night air, he shivered._

_The mud-brick walls seemed to close in about him, and all he could hear was the chattering of rats and the rustle of wind through trees._

_Then low voices cut through his terror. First the guards, slurred from drink they should not have had. Then another voice, smoother and tasting more of _aguamiel_ – honey water – than the guards' bitter cocoa _xocolatl.

_He sat up straight, heedless of the rough wall that scraped his bare back, and held his breath._

_After a few short – they lasted forever – moments of discussion, the doorway was darkened by a wiry figure. Lit from behind by torchlight, the face could not be seen._

_Roxas didn't have to see his face._

_He tried to stand, but they had broken his leg when he tried to run. Hot hands caught him before he could fall, and held him so close he could hear the unsteady beating of another heart._

_He said he was sorry._

_Roxas kissed him before he could say it again._

_He felt scalding tears trickling down his neck as the priest took him, felt the shaking in the powerful frame over his. When Roxas kissed him, he tasted the bitterness of regret on the lips that had loved him for so long._

_With his face pressed against Axoloa's neck, he told him not to be sorry. And kissed him again. Because he loved the man who was going to kill him in the morning._

_The moon set._

_The sun rose._

_They painted him in blue chalk, and brought him to wait in line at the base of the pyramid. It took hours to reach the top, and the steps were wet with the blood of those who had gone before him._

_Axoloa's obsidian knife dripped onto the stone, and there was no hope in his eyes._

_Some required attendants to restrain them, but Roxas limped to the stone table and arranged himself._

_The priest closed his eyes with shaking fingers, unwittingly smearing blood over the lids. He felt tear-drunk lips on his just before the knife tore into his stomach._

_A hand that held him and caressed him pushed up through his organs. He felt it close around his heart. _

_It was fitting. He had surrendered his heart long before._

_Through the chanting, he could hear a desperate voice._

"Forgive me."

x(X)x

He woke screaming.

x(X)x

A/N: Again, I am SO sorry for the shortness. I just can't stand to extend a chapter for no particular reason when it's telling me quite clearly that it's finished. But at least the updates are coming quickly, ne?

And how about that "Axoloa"? It's a real Aztec name that I found when I went digging. Because I have truly amazing luck.

_Leijhana tu'sai _to all readers and reviewers!


	6. Calcium

A/N: This story won't leave me alone. I'm thinking about while I'm doing homework, in class, at work, even when I try to read other things or just listen to a song for a few minutes. It is crack.

I keep stepping back to try and look at this story objectively. I'm really not in control of what happens at this point XD This is shaping up to be nothing remotely like what I had envisioned – but I think I like it more.

**Disclaimer: Roses are red, violets are blue; me no own, so you no sue!**

x(X)x

"_The flowers you gave me are rotting and still I refuse to throw them away.  
Some of the bulbs never opened quite fully  
They might so I'm waiting and staying awake.  
Things I have loved I'm allowed to keep  
I'll never know if I go to sleep."_

"The Flowers" by Regina Spektor

x(X)x

Roxas tried to remember the sensation of being ripped apart, but as days passed it became less immediate; remembered pain rather than pain itself.

He wished that more carnal memories would become equally two-dimensional. So of course they revisited him during his waking hours with unparalleled urgency. He tried to hate the memory of the man who had killed him, but found himself remembering instead the taste of helpless tears.

More and more he began sending Namine to spend time with Kairi, lashing out when she was reluctant to leave him. It became too much, watching her try to alleviate his pain when he could not begin to find the words to explain it to her. Before they had always existed on the same dark plane; now he found himself falling far beyond her.

He knew he wanted to drag her down with him, and so he sent her away.

It was not that he feared being alone. It was that he feared who was waiting for him.

After two more days of drinking bitter coffee by himself, he went looking for Axel.

x(X)x

He had stopped measuring time in hours, so he was mildly surprised to find the chemistry lab full of students.

This didn't stop Axel from walking out of the class and leaving them to their own devices.

Roxas was dragged by a hot hand clamped around his wrist until they reached an elegant room with no apparent purpose other than the display of expensive furniture.

"You hide sometimes."

Though Roxas could feel searing green eyes looking at and through him, he found himself unable to tear his gaze from a flickering candle that had been left on the mantelpiece. It had burnt down to a wide pool of wax, and soon it would die.

He wondered what happened to candles when they died.

He wondered why he was there, and if the answers he might find were worth knowing.

"Sometimes you hide, and sometimes you find me. Sometimes you love me, and sometimes you hate me; either way, you're always one stubborn sonofabitch.

"Sometimes you run away, when hiding fails you."

Roxas did not know when Axel had moved, only that he found himself pressed into a wall, the corner of a gilt frame digging into his shoulder.

Axel's face pressed against his neck. The lips that murmured and gusted humid air over his skin formed and almost-kiss. His broken, strained voice reverberated along Roxas' nerves and sent desperate messages of danger and flight throughout his body.

"I can't look at you until you stop trying to hide."

Then he was gone, and Roxas wondered if he had always felt so very cold.

x(X)x

_He spent so much time outrunning death he would forget what being alive was._

_The sweating, reeking behemoth shoving a tongue down his throat certainly wasn't helping him remember. Neither was the sweating hand fumbling in its attempts to creep beneath his clothing. They were only a few feet away from the street; The Drunk had seemed to think that setting foot in an alley meant instant invisibility._

_The passerbies were not particularly shocked or appalled. It was Paris, after all. Their bored glances and raised brows did seem to indicate, however, how little they thought of his choice of 'clientele.' It made him want a sign in flashing lights:_

Wait and see what happens next.

_There wasn't much waiting left. It was fortunate, as Roxas had just about reached his slobber threshold._

_Thin, black-gloved hands danced spider-light over the heavy shoulders from behind. Roxas watched them a felt the first stirrings of the sensual anticipation that had been so absent throughout the ministrations of The Drunk pressing against him._

_When the fingers clamped down into the fleshy throat, Roxas slipped smoothly away. The show was always better appreciated with a little distance._

_Alexis waited until The Drunk was dizzy and weak from lack of air. Then he neatly drove a thin blade through one bloodshot eye and beyond to the delicate tissue of the brain. The man screamed, jerked, and fell still. Alexis let the body fall. Part of the jellied eye had come away on his knife, and he slid it off mutely, watched it land on the grimy cobblestone._

_Then they met halfway, and Alexis kissed him until his lips bled. He couldn't take his eyes off the prone figure with its twisted face. _

_He had killed three people with his own hands in his life. They weren't experiences he cared to repeat. They had been before he met Alexis, anyway. _

_Alexis had killed innumerable times. Roxas had seen most of them. And it was only nights like _this_, involving Roxas, a dark nook, and greedy hands, that he saw Alexis take a brutal pleasure in the dispatch. _

_He would keep to this particular method just to watch the wrathful sneer that crept over Alexis' face, and to be kissed with such desperate ownership afterward._

_When they broke apart Roxas realized his eyes had closed. They shivered and laughed sharply in the night air, giddy with adrenaline. They caught a greasy pickpocket trying to disappear with The Dead Drunk's purse. They broke two of his fingers and sent him on his way._

_Once the purse was safely tucked into one of the hidden pockets of Alexis' stained coat, they slipped away between shadows and light._

_They did not walk as quickly as they should have._

_They were going to get caught one of these days._

_They would be caught, and probably hanged, and Roxas knew that in the moment before his short and final fall he would feel everything he now felt in halves: passion for the extraordinary, sensual man who would die with him, fear that was lacking, exhilaration that was coated in translucent lethargy._

_He would stop running and welcome death, because in that moment he would remember what living was._

x(X)x

_Aule was tired from the day, but it was the opium that Roxas had slipped into his wine that made him sleep._

_Another man, after pulling farmer's plows when their oxen were lame, and carrying old women over rivers to visit other old women, and building houses, and mending fences, and doing anything else that was asked of him, would have room for nothing but sleep when he finally reached his home._

_Instead, Aule would kiss him softly, ask him if he needed anything, wanted anything, and no matter how many times Roxas said no he spent hours nurturing before finally sleeping so that he could rise with the sun the following day and do it all again. And again. And again._

_The wicked were sleeping in the shade._

_It was the virtuous for whom there was no rest._

_So Roxas broke him._

_He cut the tendons in his ankles, behind his knees, cut deep into the powerful muscles. He tied the careful incisions tightly, glancing up at the sound of every unsteady breath._

_Finally, he cut off Aule's fiery hair – so if he were left alone after this, he would have something left._

_As he wrapped the bundled strands in undyed muslin, he heard the breathing from behind him change. He felt rather than saw Aule's eyes open, heard the tight gasps of pain. He found himself standing beside the bloodied bed._

_The wide eyes that found him were panicked, uncomprehending._

_Roxas laid a trembling hand over them, knowing that he could never say what needed to be said otherwise._

"_They'll make do without you. They always could. They'll make do, and forget about you, because it's not _you_ they love. _

"_I'll be here, and I don't need you to be good or strong. I just need you. _

"_I'll take care of _you_ now."_

_He moved his hand to cup the side of the strong-boned face, looking at the arch of one brow instead of directly into the eye beneath it._

_Though he shook with the strain, Aule slowly turned his head and placed a wordless kiss into his open palm._

x(X)x

_Roxas reoriented himself smoothly, exchanging his handhold on the bar for a strong grip with his knees._

_He counted the exact number of seconds as he swung, and was ready when Axel was thrown to him across the great divide, was already flying forward to catch him. _

_The exclamations and murmurings of the spellbound crowd were indistinct but present. They always seemed to like the lack of a net, the lack of safety. Roxas knew that every time they watched the trapeze, they watched because there was a chance that someone would die._

_He didn't care if he died. He didn't care about most of the troupe. _

_But Axel was gripping his hands so tightly and he could still feel him slipping. Roxas knew that the sweat on his palms was soaking through the chalk, his fear overcoming their safety measures._

_Axel slipped._

_Axel fell._

x(X)x

Roxas woke, stretched, and made a cup of coffee. He played a few games of solitaire on the computer.

When Namine woke up, he was already half-dressed and preparing to go to class.

And so began the Great Forgetting.

x(X)x

A/N: I can't remember if I mentioned this already, but _leijhana tu'sai_ means "thank you" in Cheysuli, which belongs to Jennifer Roberson aka Not Me.

To be clear, the three dreams were NOT related. Different times, different places, different circumstances.

So… _Leijhana tu'sai _to all readers and reviewers.


	7. Potassium

A/N: I was in a spot of trouble trying to decide where I wanted to go with this chapter. But I've decided, and my decision pleases me.

Actual events at work today. My boss (who is young and cool, for the record) read the first five chapters.

ME: So what are your impressions of the characters? Of Axel and Roxas, at least.

BOSS: … I don't like them (as people)

M: Is it Roxas' brattiness? Axel's… Axel-ness?

B: Well they do _kill_ people.

M: … Oh. That.

XD It honestly didn't occur to me.

x(X)x

"_I would die for you_

_I would die for you_

_I've been dying just to feel you by my side_

_To know that you're mine_

_I will cry for you_

_I will cry for you_

_I will wash away your pain with all my tears_

_And drown your fear_

_I will pray for you_

_I will pray for you_

_I will sell my soul for something pure and true_

_Someone like you_

_See your face every place that I walk in_

_Hear your voice every time I am talking_

_You will believe in me_

_And I will never be ignored_

_I will burn for you_

_Feel pain for you_

_I will twist the knife and bleed my aching heart_

_I'll tear it apart_

_I will lie for you_

_I can steal for you_

_I will crawl on hands and knees until you see_

_You're just like me_

_Violate all my love that I'm missing_

_Throw away all the pain that I'm living_

_You will believe in me_

_And I can never be ignored_

_I would die for you_

_I would kill for you_

_I will steal for you_

_I'd do time for you_

_I would wait for you_

_I'd make room for you_

_I'd sail ships for you_

_To be close to you_

_To be a part of you_

_'Cause I believe in you_

_I believe in you_

_I would die for you."_

_#1 Crush _by Garbage

x(X)x

For the first time in years, Roxas was passing all of his classes, by sheer dint of the time and attention he had applied to his homework in his sleepless nights.

Why had he done the homework? Why had he spent so many weeks sleeping in erratic fits of exhaustion?

He tried to remember, but the sharp pressure in his skull prompted him to think of other, more comfortable things.

In Latin they were having a discussion rather than a session of rote memorization, and Roxas ended up chatting animatedly with the instructor and a few die-hard history buffs about the daily living conditions at the height of the empire, the status of slaves, the intricacies of Roman dress, and certain quirks of architecture.

He thought it strange that the instructor seemed nonplussed by some of the things he mentioned. He could only have gleaned it from the text, after all.

Hadn't he?

In World History he surprised himself again with detailed tidbits, and wondered if this was how a brain operated when its owner actually studied.

In Chemistry he watched the teacher watch him. He groped for something witty and scathing, but only trite one-liners cropped up, and so he reluctantly let the urge go.

He sat at the back of the room, and would have been the last one out had he not been caught by the collar and dragged backward. Axel kicked the door until it slammed shut.

Once the instructor had perched on the edge of his desk, he seemed to lose his sense of direction. He twitched and stared at the long, narrow V of bare skin on Roxas' chest framed by black brocade and bisected by the skinny tie.

"I suppose wearing a shirt was too much trouble for you?" His restless fidgeting leeched most of the authority from the reprimand.

"It was too hot, yeah. I wouldn't mind wearing one now that it's getting cooler – but far be it from me to deprive you of the view you're so enjoying."

Axel's eyes shot upward, caught, but he didn't have the grace to flush. Instead he studied Roxas' expression intently, as if searching for something in particular and finding it lacking.

"I'm wondering if you've taken into account what I said yesterday. Given this sudden… turn in your behavior, I'm having trouble."

Roxas stared for a long moment, turned the words over a few times, and tried to make them fit.

Finally he offered "You mean when you chewed me out about not coming to class?" It had been blurry at first, just smears of color, dragging and low words, but the more he though about it, the more it resolved itself into an acceptable memory. "I would think that the 'turn in my behavior' would be exactly what you wanted."

The stormy green eyes were cartoonishly wide now. Then they narrowed to gleaming slits.

Too softly, Axel said "Are you trying to be funny?"

When Roxas arched inquisitive brows, Axel snarled something that sounded suspiciously like "dense brat" and stormed out of his own classroom. Roxas watched the hypnotic swaying of the branches beyond the window for blank moments before shaking off his daze.

x(X)x

That night Demyx caught them as they retreated from the dining hall. The ebullient instructor eagerly invited them to "Movie Night" in the professor's wing now that they were acting "relatively normal" again.

Roxas chose to go, if only to further examine the troublesome species that was Professorius Insanus. He convinced Namine to come, but she agreed only when she was able to drag Kairi along, and Kairi insisted on bringing Sora, her own twin brother.

Roxas found himself laughing as he watched them – these two who were what he and Namine might have been if they were still innocent, still children. There was no humor in the sound.

x(X)x

The opening credits of the French film were rolling on, accompanied by slow, somnolent music. Roxas could see the shifting grayscale from the corner of one eye, but was rather preoccupied with observing the chemist who had removed himself to the kitchen to make popcorn. And smoke, apparently.

The kernels were on the counter, along with butter, salt, and an antiquated air popper. And though Axel had been standing by the stove for nearly ten minutes, presumably to light the persnickety gas with a match and set the butter to melting, the dairy remained hard and cold on the counter. If Roxas craned his body just a little more, however, he could see the used matches being dropped into the sink – and that the stove was turned off.

When he quietly rose and padded into the kitchen, however, he was finally able to see the crushed butts on the counter – and the livid, circular burns on Axel's forearm. Axel caught sight of him lurking in his peripheral vision. He tugged his sleeve back down, but the movement was unhurried and unashamed.

He picked up the salt shaker, and asked a question so blandly that Roxas was halfway through saying that yes, he would like salt on his popcorn, before it registered.

_I suppose you're straight?_

Once he felt the air drying out his gaping eyes, he attempted to regain a more dignified expression. Axel seemed more than willing to wait for an answer as he leaned one hip against the counter.

"I'm asexual."

He hadn't realized it until the clumsy words tumbled forth, but it made perfect sense. It wasn't that he didn't like guys, or didn't like girls; he didn't like _people_. Other than Namine, there wasn't anyone on earth he could stand in large doses.

Axel's eyes flashed, and his motions (open the bag, pour in the kernels, find the bowl) became jerky and sharp. "Well that's just lovely for you, isn't it?"

Roxas' mouth seemed discontent with just one brainless slip; more had to be vomited up.

"But you're screwing it up."

The lanky figure grew still, stopped breathing. In the silence interrupted only by the popping of kernels, Roxas wondered if Axel's heart had stopped beating.

The maniac met his eyes slowly, and what he saw seemed to prompt the deep inhalation that broke Roxas out of deer-in-headlights mode. He darted back to Namine's side on the couch, and spent the remainder of the movie glued to the screen. He managed to escape without a word to Axel, but the feeling of that heavy, measuring gaze followed him all the way to his apartment.

x(X)x

Roxas paused with his mug of coffee half-raised, and asked Namine to repeat herself.

"Have the dreams stopped?"

His brows pinched together in confusion.

"Dreams?"

With an exasperated snarl, Namine opened her mouth to grouch at him. She closed it just as quickly, before any sound could escape. There was a sudden wariness that tightened her mouth and shook her shoulders.

It took ten minutes of attempted speech before she finally managed to squeeze out a question.

"You're not kidding. You really don't remember, do you?" The edge of her voice was growing increasingly hysterical.

Roxas protested, made all the appropriate exclamations; but the pressure at his temples was growing, and he didn't want to think about this any more. He felt fire behind his eyes, demanding to be acknowledged.

Watching him struggle, Namine fell from building hysteria to dull blankness.

"Do you remember when we were seven, Roxas? Do you remember anything about that year?"

He did. Of course he did.

Except he didn't.

Memories surfaced and fell away; visiting grandparents, occurrences at school, how he got the shining scar on his chest… They were flat and tissue-thin. From the corner of his eye they had been enough, but now he tried to touch them and they fell apart at his fingertips.

Innocence was a passing thing; what little of it he had left was savagely ripped away, leaving gossamer threads to cling to his eyelashes.

There was that antiseptic smell seeping into his skin, the gleam and pinch of needles, the lack of texture on a padded wall, the choking pressure of pills going down.

As Namine screamed and sobbed and beseeched, he vomited onto the gleaming marble of his kitchen floor.

x(X)x

A/N: I've had a pretty awful week, and I'm sorry if it affects my writing. Also, I hereby assure Livie and everyone else that Alkalinity is still the priority, and until I'm finished with it, Acerbic will have to remain my side story.

_Leijhana tu'sai_ to all readers and reviewers!


	8. Strontium

**I am SO sorry for the delay! I've been trying to upload this chapter since Sunday, but the site was screwy (not their fault).**

A/N: The holiday weekend has ended, and I want to write again! I was hoping to use my days off to mull over this chapter, explore it in great detail; instead I was stressing about how to act around my stepmother's family, so there goes that.

It's been a while since I addressed reviews…

**kairiyumi**: I'm already planning a vignette that will tell the story of those peanuts, and it's all your fault! … Seriously, though. I can picture them listening to all these conversations on airplanes, being swept back into storage every time they aren't eaten - it's the "if walls could talk" thing, ne?

**alicia**: It can, and does. I'm rather familiar with it, myself. When something is too much for us, the mind will often invent explanations, or gradually alter memories until they have no relation to what actually occurred. As for the past lives… Some things I can't tell you yet. And the first six chapters were alkaline metals, while future chapters will be alkaline in some way.

**OtakuLady**: I shall not tell you, of course, dearie. Rather, I will happily drag you through the maze with me.

**kachiqua**: You aren't a pusher, you're a reader. One is far more valued than the other. The fact that you're eager to read more, that you're involved in the story, brings me only joy (not stress). And I do think that Mr. Kalb is going to read it when he has time. Hopefully it won't cause him pain, ne?

**leafyaki**: As usual, I really don't know what I'm doing until you tell me. And that's all I can say, because otherwise I'll get sucked into the story-discussion I so desire, and likely end up telling you everything. Which wouldn't be fair. So now I exercise my self-control.

**chibi neko doll**: I'm so glad that I seem to be writing a story that people other than myself have been craving!

**blockofthewritingkind**: At this point I can't tell you without spoiling a few things. But you were right about the Aztecs. I realize it could have been read as any number of Meso or South American civilizations, but that was the one.

**Disclaimer: Roses are red, violets are blue; me no own, so you no sue!**

x(X)x

"Nothing fixes a thing so intensely in the memory as the wish to forget it." – Montaigne

x(X)x

_They still didn't believe him. They told him it wasn't real, that all was fine. _

_It felt as though his chest was shattered, crumbling away into blackness, but he did not tell them that they lied._

_They couldn't see the flames that wound around him when he tried to sleep, couldn't see the welts that made him scream and writhe. They put him in corners, hit him, told him to stop burning himself. They threw away all the matches in the house, all the lighters, candles, the nightlights, lamps, and confined him to his room._

_Then there was blankness. Sterility. Soft voices with screams quickly captured by padded walls and heavy doors._

_He could still see the flashes of red at his window, when there was still enough daylight left to salvage color. But they grew less frequent._

_Then they stopped entirely. And he was finally alone._

_It was heralded as his great breakthrough. As the dreams faded he could finally tell the woman and her clipboard that yes, something was wrong with him, it was all his imagination._

_Just to be safe, they kept giving him pills. Pills to reign in his imagination. Pills to stave off violence, after the time he tried to break the glass of his window. Antipsychotics, because they still hadn't forgotten the ways his screams reverberated through steel. Antidepressants because what was a chemical cocktail without them?_

_The combinations did odd things, made him feel the fire in his veins again. They made him uncooperative._

_Restraints and needles._

_After ten months Roxas was discharged; silent, blank-eyed, and "cured". _

x(X)x

He heard Namine, high and frantic, accompanied by a unfamiliar low voice. Colors swam before his slitted eyes.

Fingers tried to pry his mouth open. He bit down savagely and let the coppery blood fill his mouth until they were jerked away.

He drifted back into unconsciousness while hysterics rang around him.

x(X)x

Some memories are easier to bear as dreams. More and more it feels like at the end you were waking up rather than moving on.

But Roxas traced the scar on his chest. It was slightly raised, and if he squinted at it in the mirror he saw a crude triangle.

When he looked down without the benefit of glass, he saw a childish heart, cartoonish and unsteady. He remembered breaking the glass, the fractured bones of his hand, the edge that was more shallow than the others because a helpful someone had finally grabbed his arm.

His inspection was interrupted when Marluxia stepped into the bathroom, holding his bandaged fingers away from his body.

The physician had talked to Namine. They had agreed to let Roxas return to his own rooms, since the school and the infirmary were equally isolated from the rest of the world.

Roxas was glad to be away from the heavy, floral air of the hospital wing. There were flowers everywhere, petals carpeting the marble. Yet all the beds were neat and empty.

He tried very hard to ignore the trays of gleaming equipment on every available surface. Scalpels, saws, forceps, scissors, drills, and clamps, all pristine and neatly arrayed, like the treasured merchandise of an avid collector.

x(X)x

Knowing what he knew (or rather, remembered) Roxas found himself staring at the dark canopy of his bed rather than sleeping. Just as he felt the memories themselves, sharp and vivid, he could remember the fog of their suppression.

He recognized the fog now, saw it overlapping his recollection of events since his arrival. He pushed and tugged at it, pried and lashed, but it only reformed, never revealing.

After a sleepless night of strain, it parted only to remind him of a hot hand touching his shoulder, and the livid marks he scraped away.

Seared in the shape of four fingers. The side of a thumb. A palm.

Too late he remembered that ignorance was bliss.

x(X)x

A/N: Sorry about the shortness, but you know my feelings on the matter.

_Leijhana tu'sai_ to all readers and reviewers!


	9. Rubidium

A/N: I spent sooo much time stressing over this chapter. I had finally hit the part of the story where things were murkier, and I didn't have the road half-paved before me. So I kept pondering and worrying it like a loose tooth, because I feel like I owe this story more than forced, trite ideas. Today the premise of this chapter finally came to me, and I hope I serve it well.

Also, since I was probably opaque at the end of the last chapter; the hand reference was Roxas remembering the shape of the mark he scrubbed away with the nail file. You might remember that Axel gripped him by the shoulder before he fainted, and that it was their first physical contact. Hence the mark. That's all I can explain away for now, I'm afraid.

And humor me in this; the summary? Was the old summary preferable to the drama of the new one?

x(X)x

He was cut from the stomach of his first mother prematurely, as her body succumbed to the damage from her burning apartment. She died before his eyes opened. Her name was Kaijin. He had grown up thinking it meant "sea god" or "mysterious person." Then he learned that written, it meant "ash."

It wasn't the first time he reflected that the gods had a sick sense of humor.

The first time he had experienced the thought was more of a sensation. It was when he was just old enough to begin preserving memories.

Because the memories that came in flashes were indistinct and incomplete. They were far removed from the cream-colored carpets and soft voices that had so far filled his world.

His second mother went to bed one night with a handful of pills and a bottle of bourbon.

His third father took him back before earning the title.

He knew that he was Axel. That he was seventeen, and he hated citrus fruit. That he had a scar on his knee shaped like Florida, the result of an ill-conceived experiment with a skateboard. That after a long day he preferred to find Demyx and go smoke in the parking lot while the nuns ushered all the others into the cafeteria. He knew that other than being somewhat striking in appearance and possessing a charismatic speaking voice, there was nothing about him that was particularly noteworthy.

He also knew that he was older than any language still spoken on earth. He knew that whatever corporeal bubble was currently housing him would be fleeting. And at least this time he wasn't a leper. He knew that he had a soul, and that it was eternal, as surely as he knew that he didn't mean it when he fooled around with Demyx (or Zexion or Larxene or Xemnas). He knew exactly who and what he was waiting for.

It didn't make the waiting any easier. Surprisingly, he seemed unable to escape the angst-ridden doldrums of pubescence, and was unable to gather patience from his millennia of remembrance.

In college he found fire, and he wondered where she had been all his life. By the time he was old enough to drink, his scars were many and varied; the swirling constellations of his forearms, the intricate spirals of his abdomen, and the bold lines of his hips that gleamed with scar tissue.

He knew even as he knew he was eternal that fire was not enough to fill the void, or sex, or liquor, or dope-crack-cigarettes-pills-ether-shrooms-LSD-morning-glory-meth-mescaline-ecstasy-ephedra-morphine-heroin-cough-syrup-PCP-special-K-valium-lotusate-shit.

He did them all anyway.

Because it was Roxas' fault for making him wait.

x(X)x

He hated birds.

He couldn't bring himself to kill them, but he spooked them with noises and thrown objects. He couldn't sit through Hitchcock without grasping his side in remembered agony, and hating Roxas just a little for not being there, and for accepting the guilt so sincerely.

x(X)x

When he was very still at night, he could hear a second heartbeat. He would walk miles as he followed it, until it faded away and left him shivering at daybreak.

x(X)x

He knew that he would be a teacher at the academy. It was never a question. It was where all the Reiketsukan went, because they always ended up back in the orphanage that gave them their name.

It was infuriating later, knowing that he could have sought Roxas that way. That his father had come from the orphanage, that he was at the benefits every year, that he could have easily been persuaded to bring his children by with a bit of subtle suggestion.

Then Axel pictured himself sexually assaulting an eight-year-old, and laughed until he cried. And cried until he found someone to screw.

He blamed Roxas, because Roxas wanted to be blamed.

x(X)x

He went through a stage involving data. He catalogued everything as precisely as possible, from where they had been reborn, to how long they had lived and what they died of, when he knew.

And in the end he was left with only one certainty.

No matter how perfectly things turned out, how hard they tried, how upright their lifestyle; it would end tragically. Always.

Because tragically was how it began.

For days he tried to smother the following realization, but it lingered within the corners of his mind until he acknowledged it and the inevitable questions.

If it turned out _right_, with nothing tragic whatsoever, would they still come back? Or would their purpose be fulfilled?

And if that was true…

If it was…

Would he destroy them in one life just to be reunited in another?

What chilled him most was the certainty with which he answered: _YES_.

x(X)x

The edges weren't always clean.

Sometimes he reached for a paintbrush that had been in his studio in Florence. Sometimes he began conversations with his soldiers. Sometimes he heard his wife screaming when he smothered her.

Sometimes he resented all the past not-quite-hims taking up space, cluttering his thoughts.

Then he remembered Roxas, and he forgave them.

x(X)x

_Leijhana tu'sai _to all readers and reviewers!

**Remember** to chip in about the summary.


	10. Barium

**Disclaimer: Roses are red, violets are blue; me no own, so you no sue! **Let's just put it this way: If Roxas and Axel belonged to me, they would have had sex by now.

A/N: To be fair, some themes in this chapter are borrowed from Kij Johnson's _Fox Woman_. It's a fantastic novel featuring Japanese culture and folklore around the Heian period, and I hope you all will be lucky enough to read it someday (if you haven't already). There's even a smidge of gay sex! (It is all too brief, sadly, and then back to the straightness).

I'm afraid that I do have some bad news. I'm mega-uber-ultra grounded, as only my parents are capable of. So I'll have to write this here, at home, and in the library during my lunch period, and I'll keep it on a floppy disk so I can upload it at the school library. Because my dad installed a mountain of spyware, and I'm only supposed to use the computer for schoolwork. Which makes reading new fanfiction a little difficult. But anyway, who needs lunch?

That was a very long and exceptionally drawn-out way of saying that I have to be very careful and very sneaky, so updating will be a bit more erratic. If you've actually read all this, be sure to type "cookie" in your review so I remember to give you one.

**Author note has ended! Now come the quotes: Do NOT skip the quotes just because they look like a part of the author's drabble! xD**

x(X)x

And I'm haunted  
By the lives that I have loved  
And actions I have hated  
I'm haunted  
By the lives that wove the web  
Inside my haunted head

Poe – Haunted

"I once had a patient who used to practice the most horrible tortures on himself, and when I asked him why he did such things, he said, "Why, before the world does them." I asked him then, "Why not wait and see what the world will do?" and he said "Don't you see? It always comes at last, but this way at least I am master of my own destruction."

- I Never Promised You a Rose Garden

x(X)x

_There was a rustling of fabric, a whisper of small, brisk feet. The retinue of the empress scurried into the room, pale and meek women whose movements were concise and nervous. The empress did not scurry, however. The Empress Dài Tì Zhe swept into the room like the tide. _

_When she tilted his chin upward with a hand encased in yards of silk, he struggled to keep his eyes downcast. Then, when the angle became more insistent, he focused his gaze on one of her hair ornaments._

_His eyes, as they shot upward, did not miss the way her other hand wrapped itself protectively around her stomach._

_As he was bathed, garbed, and generally examined by a group of murmuring servants, he almost asked. Again and again he almost asked, but as soon as the first strangled sound reached his lips, an attendant shot him an aggravated glare, and the question was smothered again._

Why am I here?

_He thought it a vast improvement from his original question, when the courtier (and the guards) had entered his home unannounced:_

What the _hell_ do you people want?

_When he was finally alone in the room of his preparation, he tried to order his thoughts. He tried to analyze his situation, to reach a logical conclusion based upon the information that could be gleaned from the day's occurrences. But still he found no reasonable solution. Being so shaken that he could not rise from the pillow on which he knelt wasn't helping, either._

_He heard the door behind him slide open. The breath in his lungs froze and crystallized as he strained to see the newcomer at the edge of his vision. Then the lanky figure settled himself on the cushion beside him, and it was the most mundane detail that struck him first._

_The man was wearing robes. Plural. Appropriate court attire: layers of heavy, brocaded fabric:_

_Made striking only as Roxas noticed for the first time that he had been dressed in only one robe. Expensive silk, surely, but too thin, revealing too much of his frame beneath the fabric. For the first time a new suspicion brushed the boundaries of his frenzied thoughts, but his horror smothered it before it could be articulated. _

"_Are you here for an audience, as well?"_

_The inquiry shattered the silence, projecting into every corner of the small room. The shock broke Roxas from his reverie, and jerked his gaze to the stranger at his side before he could prevent it._

_The epitome of beauty, male and female, was a perfectly round face as pale as the moon. Based on this, based on his traditional education, based on logic, Roxas knew that the man was ugly. But he wondered if too much standard beauty had altered his eyes; because the bronzed, angular features were striking, exotic. And not as repulsive as they should have been._

_The man was still gazing at him expectantly, a bemused grin tugging at the corners of his wide mouth._

_Roxas flushed and returned his gaze to the floor, taking deep and silent breaths until he could recall the question and answer accordingly._

"_I may be," he began cautiously. "Who would I be seeking an audience with?"_

_He could hear the surprise in the shifting of the man's robes, in the amused exhalation._

"_Who else? Your business with the emperor must be very urgent, if you're visiting him in his personal wing."_

_The air in his throat suddenly choked him, and some piece of his sanity fractured. Strained laughter interspersed his exclamation._

"_I have no _idea_ why I'm here!" He registered the hysteric notes of his strangled voice, and they launched him into fresh gales of panicked guffawing. "I'm a _student_! In a fortnight I'll take the imperial exam and I'm not _anyone_ and I don't know why I'm _here_!"_

_He tensed when a hand, attempting to placate, took hold of his wrist. Its heat seeped through the thin fabric immediately, painful in its intensity. The grip loosened as his gasps became deep, shuddering breaths, but the hand remained._

"_The empress is with child-_

_child?-royal-child-preparation-studies-teach-tutor!-TUTOR_

"_And the emperor does not wish for the child to be lost."_

_Roxas' thoughts swirled and raged and attempted desperately to fit themselves into a logical pattern. They began to spill out of him._

"_I'm not a doctor! I don't know anything about babies or bodies or delivering-"_

_The hand tightened again, silencing him._

"_The emperor does not wish for the health of his wife and child to be threatened on his account," the man murmured gently. His eyes were earnest, though Roxas could not remember looking up to meet them._

"_At such times alternatives are offered. Concubines still offer the possibility of pregnancy, and one child at a time is more than enough." His voice grew careful._

"_And it is known by some that the emperor has certain preferences."_

_Roxas' denial struggled with the statement, tried to twist and reshape it. But his mind was quick, and arrived at the appropriate conclusion before he could blind himself._

_He was suddenly wary of the man beside him; of the implication that this courtier was one of the few close enough to the emperor to know such things. He wondered if this was a test, if there was something he was expected to do or say._

"_Who are you to the emperor? Why are you _telling_ me this?!"_

_The man stood and pulled him up as well, looping a supportive arm around his waist when Roxas' knees failed him. They moved forward, and Roxas felt bile rise at the back of his throat._

"_I am telling you this because we've been sitting in the foyer of an empty wing for quite some time now. I'm telling you because someone should have told you, and I had hoped that in the telling the fear might leave your eyes. I'm telling you because I had hoped you would be willing if you only had a chance to decide for yourself."_

_They passed through sitting rooms, a library, and other chambers that blurred together. When the man stopped and slid the final screen behind them, he released Roxas and allowed him to sink to his knees._

_All he could see was the massive bed within its frame of intricately carved wood. Then the man resumed his speech, and he wished again to be struck deaf. Worst of all was the pity in his voice, the cautious gentleness._

"_I am telling you this because in the very near future we are going to lay in that bed, and we will not sleep. But I do not wish to force you."_

_Roxas thought, then, that it would be years before he could even comfortably consider what was proposed._

_But a matter of weeks found him in the bed for more than sleep._

_A matter of months taught him not to suppress the moans that were so enjoyed by his partner, that Fen Hui preferred his name to his title during Roxas' desperate moments. He had learned to set aside his initial embarrassment, to forget the tradition that had caused him shame the first time he felt wanton._

_He had learned that Fen Hui, at least, thought of him as no less of a man, no less strong. That his intelligence and pride were never overlooked._

_He remembered clearly the night that feeling wanted became feeling cherished._

_As he began to drift off into contented sleep, now clean but still sated and slick with sweat, Fen Hui's voice roused him._

"_Rù Xué… did you learn of destiny in all your studies?" The emperor rolled onto his side then, pressing a light kiss to Roxas' forehead before murmuring against the skin._

"_Did they ever teach you that some things are meant to be?"_

_It took him many months after that to admit to himself that he loved the emperor, and many more after that to say it. His indecisive struggle was worth the desperate, devouring kiss it instigated._

_Years after his arrival, his wrist was still scarred. Never again had Fen Hui's touch burnt him, but Roxas did not regret the mark, or desire an apology. The emperor did not have to explain to him the claim in the seared skin._

_It was popular court gossip; that with his son old enough to walk, the emperor had still not returned to his wife's bed. The calculating glances of the courtiers coupled with the hissed slurs that followed behind him kept Roxas from court. Eventually he could not bring himself to leave his sanctuary. Fen Hui had created for him a haven of whispers against flesh and silk sheets. Returning to reality was too painful an experience. _

_But he was forced to the night Dài Tì Zhe gave him rice wine. He had come to fear the woman who hid her hatred beneath impeccable manners and small smiles just warm enough to dissipate Fen Hui's suspicions._

_It was too well-timed, when the guards rushed into the room. The emperor had started choking almost immediately, leaving Roxas to wonder if Dài Tì had bothered mixing any wine into the poison. Swords were raised even as the emperor tried to speak over his own erratic gasping._

_So Roxas ran light fingers over the last face he wanted to see._

_And emptied the bottle down his own throat._

x(X)x

"_Are you one of the servants?"_

_The responding grin flashed in the brilliant moonlight. _

"_Something like that." _

_The man standing across the courtyard from Roxas was impossibly tall, the effect of which was only strengthened by his stature. His spine was ramrod straight; his shoulders thrust backward, his head held high. Another man would have resembled nothing so much as a preening chicken, but Roxas thought privately that the emperor would appear a fool beside this peasant who looked every inch the king even though his feet were bare and his garb ragged._

_Roxas had left his wife and young children in the capital, expecting a solitary season at his long-neglected country manor to clear his head. A season without intrigue or politics, to sleep, meditate, and read poetry without the magnifying lens of court following his every gesture. A season to be human rather than the idea of what a human should be._

_His tranquility was almost immediately disrupted, however, by Akuseru – the servant who never worked. The giant who towered over him, and would never admit to his heritage: he offered only secretive grins when Roxas asked. Akuseru's height was, at times, the least striking of his attributes. His eyes and skin were unnaturally pale, his teeth straight, white, and sharp, and in direct sunlight his seemingly black hair revealed itself to be deep, bloody crimson._

_Roxas had spent so many years organizing every aspect of his life around beauty and perfection that Akuseru was like meeting with clean air when one had finally learned how to breathe underwater. _

_The man was loud and disorderly. His movements, though oddly elegant, were too fast and too free. He was indelicate in all things, blunt, oft sarcastic when speaking, and happy to throw off the intricate dance of precision._

_Roxas had hated it, at first, until suddenly it was natural again. Everything with Akuseru became natural: walking with steps unmeasured, laughing loudly, speaking of anything and everything without fearing offended sensibilities._

_Natural to touch lightly, to take his companion in the water after hours spent hiking to the hot spring._

_He wondered how anyone could be sustained by pleasantries and polite sentimentality when the man writhed and _mewled_ beneath him, hissed and cursed in pleasure as he hooked a long leg over Roxas' shoulder._

_His sharp nails cut bloody tracks over Roxas' shoulder blades, and Roxas wondered, as pain and pleasure mixed, if any of those trapped fools remembered what it meant to _live

_Weeks passed after the hungry copulation, with many revivals of the act to follow. _

_And Roxas reflected that though most court customs were ludicrous, there were those chosen few he could not bring himself to overlook. After such nights the man (or in this case, "man," he could hear Akuseru dryly observe) was expected to leave a gift, a sign of his regard and respect. With no one's expectations to meet but his own, Roxas found that he still wished to do so._

_But he had hardly planned for such an occurrence in his packing, and he had yet to think of anything appropriate. Because while something simple and ornamental (a comb, a fan, a lacquered box) might have suited another, he wanted an item that held some kind of true significance._

_As luck would have it, it was only days later that he found the perfect gift while hunting. He had left prepared to catch rabbit – Akuseru claimed to have a craving, and the man's desires were inevitably contagious – and found instead a fox. It would not have concerned him, but that fur…_

_The fox's markings were nearly insubstantial against a brilliant scarlet coat. It did nothing to hide the animal, and everything to remind him of Akuseru: Akuseru, who cared nothing for his clothes and would be terribly cold in the coming winter; Akuseru, who would look more appropriate than any being he knew in fur so luxurious. His lingering sense of aesthetic whispered that it was a match, pleasing to the eye._

_And so he carefully aimed, and shot the fox as it darted after one of the rabbits he had chased to this hillock._

_He allowed another servant to remove the pelt as he bathed, but insisted upon cleaning and preparing the fur himself. His arrow had been lucky; by catching the animal through the throat, it had left the fur he would be using undamaged._

_For months he waited with his present, eager anticipation bleeding into frustration, worry, panic, despair._

_He never saw Akuseru again._

x(X)x

_The villagers had apparently held the trial without him, deciding that an inquisitor was not necessary to determine what was obvious to them all._

_Roxas heard the ruckus before he saw it, observed the plume of smoke rising over the village's central square._

_He handed his horse's reins to Thomas, pushing through the gathered throng until he gained a clear view of the pyre. _

_The witch saw him in that moment, saw him and stared without comprehension. Then the red-haired man smiled past his swollen jaw, and without taking his eyes from Roxas began to laugh in a manner that bordered on hysteria._

_Then the flames caught his clothing, and the screaming began._

x(X)x

As in all times of desperation, Roxas found himself relying more and more on coolly precise logic to make it through his days. Strange dreams could be chalked up to stress, over-imagination, and an intensive history course. The nature of the dreams was the nature of any other, of course: his subconscious mind was refracting data back to him in an order made puzzling only by its lack of rhyme or reason.

These were calming thoughts, and they became the murmuring undercurrent to every moment. When trying to find the bathroom in a certain corridor, or plowing through columns of equations, the mantra was unceasing. He had not yet assigned words to it, and feared doing so.

In contrast to his vivid unconscious hours, those spent in the waking were made increasingly notable by their blinding normalcy. Life went on around him; indeed, it had not ceased its churning advancement for even a moment. Classes began and ended at set hours, meals were consumed, gossip and idle conversation exchanged. And every day, reciting his logical reassurances to himself like a cold rosary, Roxas felt a little older, a little more tired. It was not age in the sensation of maturity but in fragile, papery skin stretched too thin over bone. It was in his inability to summon even passing interest in his surroundings while they moved around him, the unmoving boulder around which the stream parts.

He had grown so distant that his eventual return to reality was sudden, even painful. And vaguely humiliating, of course, because why wouldn't it be?

_Medea_ was a strange play, though its strangeness definitely qualified it for Saix's class (in which no body of literature was complete without violent death). Saix reduced to tears the few girls brave enough to attempt reading the title role aloud for the class, before moving to the male denomination.

And so, unwilling and lethargic, Roxas became a woman. A furious woman of Asian descent, in fact. Medea, after killing her brother, betraying her father, leaving her homeland, bearing sons, and performing numerous other errands for Jason, sought revenge that Roxas couldn't help but view as righteous when Jason left her for the young princess of Corinth and the power his new marriage could bring.

The woman had given all and lost everything, and was willing to destroy herself if only to achieve her vengeance upon Jason. And though he began flat and disinterested, Roxas found himself caring, attached to this woman and occasionally defending her to his classmates. Her words tasted of bitter regret and hopelessness, desperation and despair. And no matter how many times Roxas repeated his silent mantra, he recognized the flavor all too well.

"I loved you once: And I am ashamed of it: but there are some things that ought to be remembered by you and me.

"…shall I fly home – to put my neck in the coil of a knotted rope, for the crimes I served you with?

"This is it. I did not surely know it: loathing is all. This flesh he has touched and fouled. These hands that wrought for him, these knees that ran his errands. This body that took his… what they call love, and made children of it. If I could peel off the flesh, the children, the memory… Poor misused hand: poor defiled arm: your bones are not unshapely. If I could tear off the flesh and be bones, naked bones; salt-scoured bones on the shore at home…"

Roxas kept his voice from shaking, at least. His eyes burned, but remained dry. He read until she immolated her enemies, and killed her own sons so that Jason might learn what it was to lose all.

He quietly envied her courage.

x(X)x

A/N: I had another segment planned for this chapter, but it's taken me so long to sneak the necessary writing time that I've lost chunks of it from my mental storehouse, and I don't want to serve anything of truly abysmal quality if it can be helped.

Say… do we have any Sandman fans in here? Because I have a treat coming up for you.

Finally, remember that reviews are amazing and truly the only reason I check my email daily. Also, I was just rejected from my state's Governor's School for the Arts (the creative writing program.) And while an esteemed educator assures me that their selection process is far from fair, I've still been feeling really low since I got the letter. So while you don't have to review, maybe some sense of empathy will drive you to it?

_Leijhana tu'sai _to all readers and reviewers!


	11. Caesium

When Axel stirred, he did not immediately realize that he was dreaming. His body was bare, stretched languidly over sun-warmed stone. The light permeated his skin and soaked into the underlying muscle like warm water. The air he so luxuriously inhaled was sharp and clean, with the crisp edge of early autumn. It was blissfully quiet; on the high plateau no sound reached him aside from the faint chirrups of insects in long grass, and the occasional faraway cries of birds.

Birds. Fucking birds.

He sat up with a start when the realization hit him. That he had a reason to hate the damn things. And he hadn't hated them before, so that meant he was after. So easily he had slipped into his old skin. But the before was gone, was never coming back, had long since abandoned him.

And so he knew he was dreaming.

With the thought came change. Even as he let his eyes rest on the surrounding mountains they blurred and bled and became other.

The familiar stone beneath him became cold marble. The bright, empty sky was supplanted by a high arched ceiling. Color had been leached from the room as marrow from a bone – it was a monument to weariness in blues, grays, and shadows. When he glanced ahead and discerned that he was not alone in this strange place (strange, though he knew he had been there before) it was more because his eye was caught by the throne and its raised platform than the figure cradled within it.

His face, ever so slightly out of focus no matter how powerfully Axel squinted, seemed terribly young. Gaunt and pale, he carried the haggard exhaustion of one far older. Lank pale hair fell into his thin face, and his white garments were frayed. Threadbare jeans; a sweater, the dangling sleeves of which swallowed his arms while the collar gaped and exposed his vulnerable neck and pronounced collarbones; scuffed sneakers with unkempt laces. A large cut gem hung heavily over his chest and glinted, jade pale.

He was wrong. Out of time, out of place.

Axel felt his pulse quicken as a chill ghosted over his skin. He was no longer nude, at least. Some simple tunic covered him from shoulder to knee.

Growing disquiet caused his voice to emit as a guttural growl.

"Where is Oneiros?"

The boy – Axel could not bring himself to think of him as a man, even a young one, when he seemed so wan and frail – did not acknowledge him. He remained slumped in the throne, his head wearily bent. Axel intended to rise, but not to shout. Yet both occurred.

"Where is Morpheus? Where is Dream?!"

Then the boy raised his head and from within his black eyes (black, all black, with no white to relieve it) shone stars.

It aged him even further. His voice, low and tired, was not a child's. When he spoke, the stone surrounding them reverberated faintly, hummed as if recognizing ownership.

"This is no longer Morpheus' realm."

The statement drew an involuntary shudder from him before he regained command of his composure.

"Dream had a son…" he said slowly. "But you are _not_ Orpheus."

The boy took on what he may have intended to be a comforting tone, but his voice was still too detached and alien to inspire any sort of comfort.

"No. Orpheus is dead, and Dream soon after.

"I was once David. I am Dream now, and always have been, and always will be. And I am responsible for fulfilling my fa- my predecessor's obligation."

Axel did not immediately take his meaning; when he did, he scoffed audibly.

"Are you now? And it just so happens to come a century late?"

The dark, brooding presence faded, leaving him with the wan-faced boy tilting his head to the side, and observing his visitor with the sort of perplexed blankness one might bestow on a struggling insect.

And then Axel woke.

xXx

He called in a sick day, instructing his three classes to distribute as was necessary. Larxene, Xigbar, and Zexion would all cover for him during their respective planning periods.

Was it better to live without meeting Roxas at all, or to encounter him only to be kept at arm's length? Memory overcame him.

He remembered the war (_a_ war, he amended. There had been so very many.) He remembered the "trench foot" that became gangrenous and attracted hordes of stinging flies. He had lost half the leg a few months later, torn to ribbons by shrapnel before he ever saw a physician for the prior affliction.

He remembered the rats that skittered over his fingers. If you slept too soundly, or grew too still, you became food. The meals rationed to the soldiers were little better fare; cold pea soup and rancid horse meat, month after month, were hard to swallow. But they did. They fought as they were told to fight, and bled as they were told to bleed, because the Kaiser had promised to make them a great nation once more.

He remembered being very young, and terribly afraid. Huddling in his dugout within the trench, he listened to the approaching front and its staccato chorus of artillery.

He remembered his first skirmish. The downpour had soaked him to the bone in an instant and transformed an already barren field into a treacherous sheet of sludge that tangled wary steps. It seemed the most likely place to encounter his yang, after all. It was suitably tragic. He always paused before shooting to squint through the deluge for Roxas' face.

Two members of his regiment died for those pauses.

So Axel stopped looking.

In that life he died before his twenty-third birthday. It was July of 1918, at Chateau-Thierry. The Allies won, and the war was nearly ended.

He never saw the end.

He never saw Roxas.

xXx

When he was drawn from his memories, it was not by the polite chirp of his egg timer, or the keen whistling of the kettle, or even the sharp hiss as the water boiled over the edges and dripped into the flickering flame. It was his cigarette, burning to a cinder against his knuckles.

He watched it glow from within for a long moment as it ate away his skin. Then he tossed it into the sink, taking the kettle from the stove first so that he might run cool water over both his fresh burn and the welt across his palm that he was ready for when he lifted the hot metal by hand.

It distracted him, and more than anything he wished to be distracted.

xXx

If there was one virtue he could attribute to Demyx (a ridiculous thought, when so many were present) it was that his friend had an uncanny sense of empathy. Axel's pride would never allow him to seek comfort, but no matter where he hid himself, the moment he fell into dark Demyx found him.

True to form, Demyx was at the door before the ointment had time to seep fully into his skin. Another well-meaning friend might have brought soup or medicine for his "illness." Demyx knew him better, and brought him beer and fresh cigarettes. Axel was more than happy to sweep a stack of ungraded quizzes from his kitchen table to make room.

They were each on their third (No that wasn't right, he corrected himself. Demyx was on his second, and he was on his fourth. Still, the sum was the same.) when Demyx took it upon himself to begin offering hesitant love advice.

"Maybe… you could try the direct approach?" he suggested doubtfully.

Axel laughed so hard and sudden that he swallowed his smoke. He coughed as he wiped at the bitterly mirthful dampness gathering around his eyes.

"Directness with Roxas is a path to direct dismemberment. He's… you have to think of it as handling an unstable element. You handle him carefully, with some necessary distance."

"I'm just saying," Demyx murmured. He paused with the bottle to his lips. "Your results so far haven't exactly been dazzling. Has your way _ever_ worked?"

Despite his frustration, Axel smiled faintly. Of all his old friends, only Demyx and Xemnas knew why he was so… well… as Xigbar had once so poetically phrased it, "royally fucked up." Demyx because he had earned that trust, and Xemnas because he was too discerning for his own damn good. Demyx had seemed to regard it as an indulgent fiction until Roxas finally appeared. Now he was gradually accepting a reality that, to his mind, could not possibly exist.

"I've had more success in prior ventures. There were a handful of blissful times when _he_ came to_ me_. I mean…" He swallowed a mirthless laugh. "He always _finds_ me. But there were times when he wanted me. When he loved me, and needed me more than air. Times when it wasn't hard until I lost him again."

Talking about Roxas always made Axel's speech peculiarly fluid. He was often sparing in his speech, as words spilled from his lips in awkward, tangled forms not to his liking. But he had lifetimes of Roxas, millennia of practice. What began as a small but relevant anecdote would flow into hours of reminiscence without his realization. These hours disturbed him somewhat – in them he became not himself. Axel Reiketsukan: irreverent chemistry instructor, sometime pyromaniac, orphan and licensed sushi chef… he ceased to exist. His usual tenuous balance of past and present fell away, and memories were all he had. It stripped skin and flesh from him until all that remained were the bones, eternal and unchaning.

And yet he welcomed it when it came. He told Demyx of Egypt, of Rome, of Russia. He told him a fraction of what Roxas had done to him, and what he had done to Roxas. He told him of the beautiful, soft-eyed woman who would lead Demyx away on the day of his death. (She and Axel were old friends now. He wondered how long it would be before he could ask her about the new Dream.)

It was hours later, when the noon sun streamed through his long kitchen windows, that the conversation finally lulled. The alcohol and the golden warmth of the light through his clothes left him heavy-lidded and drowsy. The intervals between moments became indistinct, as if viewed through flickering strobe light. He was not sure when he and Demyx had slumped their way down to the kitchen floor in a tangled heap, or how Demyx's shirt had come to be pooled in the corner, or how his friend's collarbone had ended up caught lightly between his teeth. He paused with his lips pressed against the soft skin.

It was a familiar position, in many respects a comforting one. It could have been any one of numerous hazy afternoons, so spent since they were teenagers. But in the pit of his stomach he was sick, and not from substances consumed. He drew away slightly, though his arms remained loosely draped: one tangled gently in the soft, short hair at the base of Demyx's neck, the other wrapped around his slim waist.

Demyx stilled as well, awkward despite his usual grace. They remained facing one another, Demyx kneeling between Axel's folded legs. His neck and spine, arched in response to the bite, slumped. He exhaled before speaking softly.

"Is it… because it's me, or because I'm not him?"

Axel flinched minutely, knowing even as he tried to mask the expression that Demyx could read him perfectly well. He wrapped his arms more securely around Demyx's shoulders, careful to keep the embrace soothing rather than sexual.

"You're one of the most beautiful people I've ever seen, Dem. But even if I want you – and believe me, I _do_ – I _need_ Roxas. Trying to substitute anything for him now will just end up hurting. And Dem… don't you think it's time you took your own advice? What we do may feel good, but you need Zexion. We both know he wants you, at least, and I'm fairly sure he needs you, too."

Demyx snorted abruptly. "Well _that's_ encouraging. But I want him to love me more than I want him to need me, and I'm not sure he can do that. Now," he continued, standing so abruptly that his belt buckle nearly caught Axel's nose, "let's drink to _your_ emotional drama. I didn't come over here to talk about mine."

xXx

Axel mumbled his way through the next day's classes without ever fully removing his throbbing head from his desk. The following day, however, he bounded into his classroom fresh and hangover-free. Unwilling to allow himself to be deflated by the day's usual tedium, he assigned his students independent study while he reaffirmed the temperatures at which various office supplies melted.

When Roxas' class began to trickle in, though, he paused, the flaming end of a red pencil still dangling idly from his fingers. When Roxas himself meandered sullenly in, he was decided. The sort of giddy excitement he thought he had outgrown years ago bubble up in his stomach.

"Field trip," he announced, rising from his chair so abruptly that it overturned with a clatter. His students froze like so many deer, many caught in the process of preparing for class, as if any reaction to the sacred words might cause them to evaporate. Only Roxas remained aloof, watching him with hooded, suspicious eyes.

"_Now_," he added. Satchels were slipped from shoulders and voluminous textbooks were abandoned to unoccupied desks. His herd followed him eagerly out the door and down the hall. He could hear their whispered speculations, but they did not directly ask him what their destination would be.

Once he had led them from the building itself, he halted their tremulous party upon the sprawling lawn.

"Go ahead and split into pairs. You are to _stay_ with your partner at all times. You try to reenter the building without them and I'll lock your ass out."

He half watched them scatter and reassemble, the rest of his attention diverted to observing the weather. The hot blue sky was strung with wisps of cloud, though not nearly enough to promise any degree of rain. The only real impediment to his venture was the air itself, scorched and crushingly humid. He was beginning to remove his navy button-down when Sora's piping voice carried over from the opposite side of the flock.

"Oh, good, we're an even number. Hey, Roxas, do you want-

"Sora!" Axel barked. The boy's spine snapped to ramrod straightness with gratifying alacrity. "Go partner with Yuffie and your sister." He couldn't remember any movement on the part of his feet, but he was conveniently next to Roxas now. He took his student (though Roxas was just his student like Demyx was just his drinking buddy) by one slim shoulder and dragged him to the front of the flock. To his surprise, Roxas (though hardly enthusiastic) did not dig in his heels. He finished removing his shirt and tied it around his waist, ignoring a muttered comment on Roxas' part which sounded suspiciously like "_very_ professional."

His class looked laughably conspicuous in their black and brocade as he led them over hills and through shady copses. The attire, which was so suitable in the overtly baroque academy, was made ridiculous when smeared with soil and dampened by sweat. Even the light was too bright, too warm. In more thickly wooded areas he heard the occasional grunts when they tripped over roots, or squeals when they walked through spiderwebs. When he himself tripped, however, they were in an open clearing.

Roxas had apparently decided that there were fates worse than looking unprofessional – such as heatstroke. He first loosed him tie, stuffing it in the pocket of his jacket. Then he tugged off the jacket itself, securing the sleeves around his own narrow waist.

Axel had countless memories, recalled often and desperately, of Roxas in far more extensive states of undress, in far more intimate situations. But memories, no matter how vivid, were a poor substitute for physical presence. It was the first time, he realized, that he had seen so much of Roxas' bare skin with his eyes rather than his mind.

He was so flawless, so thoughtlessly sensual, that it hurt. He was rather too thin, true, but the bones of his shoulders and ribs, not to mention his spine and slim hips, were erotic where they pushed against his luminescent skin. Fine downy hairs dusted the nape of his neck. The rest of the class had halted when their professor did, but Roxas strode ahead several paces before pausing to turn. It afforded Axel a better view of the taut flatness of his stomach, as well as the graceful hollows of his throat and collarbones. Metal glinted in his navel, as well as in a delicate ring puncturing one rosy nipple. His eyes wandered up Roxas' slender neck – he could not look at it without remembering how it appeared when arching, how Roxas' back bowed when he screamed his climax.

His face was cherubic, as always, but it was lent a new and feral edge by the piercings in his brow and lip. The intricate shells of his ears were likewise ornamented.

He did not know what expression was in his eyes when he met the icy, near-hostile gaze being leveled his way. Whatever it was sent a shudder through Roxas. He turned and strode ahead as though nothing had passed between them, and Axel let him go.

xXx

In the end, the trek was slightly longer than Axel remembered. A little over an hour had elapsed since their departure: time enough for his pace to weary a number of his less hardy pupils.

Their whines and protests dried up when they crested the final hillock. He supposed they had come to take their isolation for granted. Again, only Roxas seemed unamazed. Axel supposed he was one of the few, if not the _only_ student, who had noted the fields of corn and wheat through which they passed – and their implications.

The village looked unchanged as always. It was dominated by its well-trodden square, and edged in clusters of simple houses. There were more scattered across several miles, belonging to the more industrious farmers who carted in their wares. Mr. S had caused quite a stir the year before in buying a decrepit old French truck to drive down the unpaved paths to town, but all his fellows were content to retain usage of their horse carts.

Axel was more than pleased with the status quo – the village was generally timeless, a soothing balm to his too-often exacerbated nerves.

Most of the faces that greeted him were familiar and welcoming. Two twin girls darted past him, their pale hair hanging tangled down their backs, their flushed cheeks streaked with mud. He remembered their births, a first broken bone, a first venture beyond the village's indistinct borders. They flitted back to tug at his wrists and babble their incoherent enthusiasm, and he ruffled their flaxen hair before gently but firmly steering them away.

Tedious moments were expended to release his stunned class with a few succinct directions. Once they had scattered from sight he inhaled deeply and relaxed as though his strings had been cut.


End file.
